Living within walking distance of work has never been more crucial than it was yesterday. Due to an explosion at the local substation, my neighborhood of the East Village blacked out (for once, not because of all the drinking establishments) at 9 p.m. Monday night.

Yesterday morning, in desperation, I began walking through what was essentially the Sandy War Zone. I have never seen anything like it.

(I didn't try to take pics because I was trying to conserve my phone, since we had no power to juice it up.)

Miraculously, the office was open and functioning (phone service is wonky today).

As of yesterday at 5 pm, every transport mode was suspended. But last night, as I walked through dark, unlit streets navigating streams of vehicles that were in turn navigating intersections with no traffic lights, I saw a few MTA buses churning along the branch-riddled streets.

MTA's website says beginning this afternoon, both Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North Railroad will begin to provide limited service. There will be limited subway service on several routes by Thursday as well.

Thousands of MTA workers are still out across the entire 5,000 square mile MTA service region inspecting and repairing the damage, according to the MTA website.

Newark and JFK began limited service as well. LaGuardia is closed, and it's not hard to see why.

The US Dept. of Transportation is releasing $13 million in emergency funds for New York and Rhode Island as announced today on its site.

And ConEdison to date has restored power to 109,000 customers although hundreds of thousands of others, like myself, must wait longer.  Con Edison says it has secured assistance from 1,400 external contractors and mutual aid workers from utilities as far west as California.